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Officer Anthony Montano and Sgt. Thomas Riedel were on patrol around 12:45 a.m. Wednesday, March 27, when they saw a 2008 Jeep Commander back out of the driveway of the River Road home where Gerald Gaimo died in an intense pre-dawn house fire last November, Lt. Geoffrey Cole said.
The home had been boarded up following the fire, he noted.The Jeep driver suddenly turned the wrong way down a one-way street when police pulled them over, the lieutenant said.
The driver, Luis Elizondo-Terrazas, a 36-year-old Mexican national, and passenger, Alejandro Villapando Jr., 50, had "a strong odor" of smoke coming from their clothes and from inside the vehicle, Cole said.
"Their hands were also black and covered with soot," he added.
In the vehicle police found "a large amount of home goods and tools" from the home, Cole said.
Elizondo-Terrazas and Villapando were charged with burglary, theft, criminal mischief, receiving stolen property and possession of burglary tools. Then they were sent to the Bergen County Jail to await a first appearance in Central Judicial Processing Court in Hackensack.
Elizondo-Terrazas also received several motor vehicle summonses, the lieutenant said.
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